Yemassee

2012 Pocataligo Poetry Contest Results

Congratulations to Karrie Waarala of Ypsilanti, Michigan, whose poem, “A Sudden Blow,” won the 2012 Pocataligo Poetry Contest.  She will receive $500 and publication in our upcoming issue.  Our guest judge was Kate Daniels. 

Congratulations also to the runners-up, Ben McClendon and Anna Scotti. 

A full list of the contest results is below.

Winner: “A Sudden Blow” by Karrie Waarala, Ypsilanti, MI   

 Karrie Waarala holds an MFA from the Stonecoast Program at University of Southern Maine. Her work has appeared is forthcoming in journals such as Iron Horse Literary Review, PANK, The Collagist, Arsenic Lobster, and Radius. Karrie is currently working on finding a home for her collection of wayward circus sideshow poems, upon which she based her one-woman show, LONG GONE: A Poetry Sideshow, which debuted to critical acclaim. She really wishes she could tame tigers and swallow swords.

 Runners-Up:

“Hazards of Perpetual Motion” by Ben McClendon, Flagstaff, AZ.

Ben McClendon is a recent graduate of the creative writing program at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, where he teaches composition to students willing and unwilling alike. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Indiana Review, Chautauqua Literary Journal, The Minutiae, and Redivider. 

“Jellyfish” by Anna Scotti

Anna Scotti’s work appears frequently in Chautauqua, and her poem, “National Geographic Society, 1968,” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize this year. Scotti’s work was also recently honored by The Comstock Review and will appear in the next issues of that journal, and in Ontologica and ReadShortFiction.com. Scotti earned an MFA at Antioch University Los Angeles in 2007. She recently finished writing her first YA novel, Big and Bad and How I Got My Life! Back.

Finalists (alphabetical order): 

“Tradition” by Emily Benton

“Litany” by Emma Bolden

“Inside Me” by Abigail Browning

“Whore Psalm” by Matt Dennison

“Two Exchanges” by Brett Foster

“Nerves” by Emily Grise

“Love Poem” by Therin Johns

“Charon Scattering Ashes” by Henry W. Leung

“Brotherring” by Shae Savoy

“Attempts at Flight” by Staci Schoenfeld